We did it our way - making music the Curious way - Paula Sounds off!!

You may well be aware of the BBC and its campaign to promote the benefits of music for people living with dementia.

It is a great campaign but spare a thought for those of us who have been working hard for many years sharing and facilitating music and movement sessions that are based around the joys and the possibilities inherent in the art of moving together.

Curiosity Cafe has always had a strong musical programme and the techniques which are used are founded on many years of experience working alongside people living with dementia in care homes, community centres, hospitals and now in our lovely homely Arts Centre in Amble.

We can testify that indeed music can make a huge difference having the capacity to offer alternative ways of communicating and enhancing levels of participation considerably.

Here is an example of Curiosity Cafe drumming together…good isn’t it - quite a groove!

As ever though the important thing to remember is that every person is a person in their own right and that musical tastes vary enormously and that for some people silence is indeed golden.

As a civil society we all want to find ways to solve the personal, social and economic challenges that dementia poses. The harsh truth is there is no one size fits all easy answer. That is why we continue to offer creative programmes which are small and bespoke here at Curiosity Cafe and continue to be sensitive to everyone’s needs.

We have spent over two years meticulously documenting and curating the Playlist for our present Curiosity Group, Its hard work and requires much more nuance and skill than blanket music coverage.

The key to any sort of musical conversation is listening…

So as ever we encourage people to get to know about dementia, get to know the person behind the label of dementia and see what music you might make together then.

In our session this week we made the music ourselves, no one leading, at the fore was careful listening and supporting each other. We were playing the moment and a wondrous rhythmic, breathing, pulsing orchestration arose…a profound sense of communication

We urge you like Mr Sinatra (who always did it his way !) to pay heed to people living with dementia and afford them the opportunity to do it their way.